Hold Onto Nothing, As Fast As You Can
by silverluna
Summary: Though she tries to remain professional, Juliet's heartache from the past three years surfaces while Shawn tries to trick her into giving up information. Episode Tag for Season Four's "High Top Fade Out". One Shot.


Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media franchise. No copyright infringement is intended.

Characters: Juliet O'Hara, Shawn Spencer. (No pairings).

Summary: Though she tries to remain professional, Juliet's heartache from the past three years surfaces while Shawn tries to trick her into giving up information. Episode Tag for Season Four's "High Top Fade Out".

Author's Note: This is a Character Fantasy for Mia, who asked for an episode tag for "Juliet's POV on the whole Shawn using Abby as a ploy thing" in "High Top Fade Out".

Spoilers for Season 1's "Spellingg Bee", Season 3's "An Evening With Mr. Yang", Season 4's "Bollywood Homicide" and "High Top Fade Out".

As always, I appreciate reviews, ratings, feedback and constructive criticism. Happy reading!

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**Hold Onto Nothing, As Fast As You Can**

A _Psych_ story

by silverluna

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"_Come on_, Jules," Shawn pressed with an award winning grin, at the same time pressing closer towards her face, "you're not going to let things be awkward between us because of Abigail, are you?"

_He did not. He did not just—_ Juliet swallowed a clump of unprofessional expletives, pressing her lips together in a hard line. She fixed a laser-like glare on Shawn Spencer, who had pulled up a chair beside her, leaning into her personal space with a story and a smile, turning up his charm to its most sickening level.

Juliet imagined the glare as red-hot and able to sear flesh, maybe even cut into bone. Was this really the guy she'd found endearing for so long, the guy whom she had— Juliet suppressed an angry sneer of her lip. That was— in the past. Right now, Shawn was trying to force her to spill the beans, information she may have willingly given any other day for just an inappropriate joke or a toothy white grin. Juliet felt disgusted with herself. She had let Shawn get away with too much because she had had a soft spot for him— key word "had".

Juliet closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. She made a hard fist around her pencil; he was going to win unless she reined herself in from soaking in the toxicity of the past. What could have been was— never there in the first place.

He was leering at her, close enough that she could recognize his familiar male smell that usually turned her head— of soap, mild sweat, copious hair gel and pineapple pulp that often stuck under his short fingernails. For two beats, it was hard to breathe. This was how it was; time and more time in between was going to dull this excessive ache of not being his chosen one.

Juliet forced her scowl into an angry smile, molding her closed lips across her teeth so hard it hurt. "I'm sure your _girlfriend_ really appreciates being _used_ like that, Shawn."

The deadly venom in her voice, Juliet noted, had made Shawn's usually easy smile falter, and made him pull back, away from her. She focused on the large stack of files in front of her so she wouldn't look at his darting eyes as he tried to regroup. She knew that's what he was planning; though he was mere seconds away from a crash and burn— maybe a large, fiery explosion— with— with no survivors. Juliet hoped.

Shawn was using his "eighth grade Jules voice", a trick he had improvised while speaking to her on the day they met at the diner. Maybe then it had been— something? She was new in town, first day on the job as an SBPD detective. Maybe she had wanted it be something, a friendly face, welcoming her (certainly this was not her new partner or her new Chief). Before her transfer, she boxed up her past, with good riddance to Miami, with its jagged edges and false starts, the disharmonious way it promised her more, more, without ever delivering. On the plane to California, she finally released her smile from its cage, unlocked the chains from her forced limitations. She allowed herself to be optimistic for the first time in years.

Then they met.

That first day, before she knew he was a psychic, Juliet had gone unimpressed, frowning at the memory of this unshaven civilian making her as a cop in less than three minutes. He was now forcing her to relive those stupid moments, and Juliet despised him for it. She found herself pummeled by too much sweetness, the kind so sharp it hurt her teeth; she had to fight the vicious urge to smack her open palm onto her desk Chief Karen Vick style. _How dare he._ He was always pushing every one of her buttons and triggers, then pushing them again in random order, faster or slower, just to tease. She used to find it cute, how he left her reeling, flustered, flushed. Just a week ago, he'd brought his high school crush— now girlfriend— in to flaunt right in front her. _How was I _that_ stupid? I knew, I knew, the very first day we met that there would be nothing between us. _

Juliet held onto that, the nothingness, the nothingness between them, from then, to now. To this moment. Anything that had been was only a ploy, a flirtation to butter her up, soften the harder edges that she had fought hard to craft, perfect— the ones she needed in the mostly male career police detective world— anything she had thought she had seen coming at her from Shawn's direction was phony. And that she had bared her heart, holding its beating energy in her hands, pushing its red hot mass towards Shawn in the drive-in theater's concession lobby—

In all this, she realized that she harbored no negative feelings towards Abigail— Shawn's _girlfriend_— _ha,_ she sneered to herself. That word, even when only thought to herself, still curled at the edges as if on fire, sagging in the middle as it disintegrated into ash. Of course, it had been awkward meeting her last week; Juliet felt her cheeks flush under the guise of her foundation, recalling how she'd rambled on about considering teaching small children herself as an alternate career option— _god_. She had almost never been happier that Carlton showed up to interrupt her rudely without acknowledgment or apology.

But the "problem" was not this girl— Abigail, the "one that got away". The problem was him. Shawn was the problem. It was such a simple conclusion; she had been blinded by the throes of falsified emotions, lead ons, by a pretender dangling something attractive before her— a challenge, the reward something different, sweet. One of those things literally right in front of her face. He was incapable of listening to her, or if not listening, then hearing her. She listened to him repeat her elongated sentence starting with, "Contrary to _your_ belief, things are not always about _you_" where he put his own spin on it, ending it with "Abigail".

"Oh, so this is the part where I'm supposed to giggle because your boyish charm is just _too irresistible_?" Juliet asked snappishly, letting the sarcasm dribble down her chin like drool. (She felt it was actually an attractive look for her.)

Shawn was trying again, but without actually putting any effort into it.

She let herself enjoy his short-lived groveling, knowing the whole time she wouldn't crack open her thin shell, wouldn't give him a single morsel, or kernel, or anything in its smallest measurement. He was on his own, well almost, and this was just the best resolution. _Why did I waste my time? Ugh. Keep it professional, O'Hara, _she coached herself. She spun in her chair, away from him, determined not to let him waste another second of her precious time. This case that she was determined to not let Shawn and Gus in on was getting more complicated. She couldn't help hating the part of her which enjoyed the deception, the great big secret, but she also couldn't help feel the slightest vindicated that she knew something that Shawn Spencer wouldn't.

_"Shawn, you deserve more than popcorn. Let me take you out for a real dinner. . . ." _Juliet winced, pinching her eyebrows together sharply. These small attacks, the words she'd said to him that night, continued to play repetitiously across her consciousness; having him around, right next to her, certainly didn't help. Maybe, in this case, the best course of action was to pull a Shawn Spencer and just run away. She wasn't going to get any work done with all this crap, with yet another mention of Abigail. _Fine_.

Juliet stood, gathering the pile of folders against her chest. "I'm sure your girlfriend appreciates being used as a tactic to scam information, Shawn. Gold Star." She mocked-winked, hearing the satisfying click of her high heels walking away from him. Now, this was all right. Leaving. This was her favorite part, lately, walking away, leaving. What she had done that night, collecting the mangled pieces of her heart, sticking it in a pile of mush back inside her chest, trying not to crawl away as if she wasn't the stupidest woman on the planet.

_Just a mistake. I made a mistake,_ she told herself now. Reliving each second was still agonizing, like being unable to breathe for five full minutes. After three years of tense flirtations, she thought she was falling, falling. . . . Until now, she hadn't let one misplaced emotion out of her sight. _A good run,_ Juliet nodded to herself. _It was a good run, and now it's done._ He wasn't going to win this round, or any several there may be after. But since he wasn't going away any time soon, she knew she had to be the one to walk from him, end the conversation shortly, keep to the jargon of police work, all business all the time. Juliet decided that whenever she felt herself weaken, she would open this book and take a page from it— these days, the ones of the largest undercover drug sting in the SBPD's history— these were the days, the real ones.

They were the days that reminded her that it was done, it was over. The SBPD was where she belonged, and where he would never belong. A soothing thought, warming, one that made her feel strangely safe, like going home overtook her in her stride away, though it subsequently made her shiver, just for a moment. Then there was work to do, her partner calling out her name, officers and clerks to pass her files off to, to dictate to. It was easy to forget, really. And she couldn't hold onto nothing for too long, grasping and gasping, or one of these days she was really going to fall.

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**The End**


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